Being inspired by recent homicides I’ve decided to study, how does one become a crime scene investigator, or homicide detective?
Also, who do you gather is Jack The Ripper? I’ve been fighting in my mind whether it was the surgeon’s late wife or perhaps the artist Walter Sickert, your all knowing genius would really help put my opinions to rest. Who on earth was Jack The Ripper? Can anyone answer such a haunting question?
-Eager Beaver over and out.
Prolly a foreign skipper.
There’s no telling who Jack was, and there never will be at this point. It is the very epitome of a cold case.
As to homicide detective, I suspect that it starts with joining the police force, working as a beat cop for a while, then working your way up. That’s pretty much the only way to do it. I’m not really sure what a crime scene investigator is, so I can’t comment on that.
Some believe Jack the Ripper was H.H. Holmes, the Chicago serial killer depicted in the book Devil in the White City. One must admit it’s a fairly compelling theory on its surface.
Homicide detectives are generally thought of as the elite detectives of police force so indeed, one works up to it - or tries to.
Crime scene investigators are technicians, so prior training is required.
As to jack - “I’ve been fighting in my mind whether it was the surgeon’s late wife or perhaps the artist Walter Sickert”
Plainly nobodiy’s “late” relatives committed any crimes - late means dead. What surgeon? I have never read any theory suggesting a woman as this murderrer.
Crime fiction author patricia Cornwell believes it was Sickert, I am not convinced.
It’s been a while since i read into this case but one suspect was a Polish guy and I favor him as the killer.
H.H. Holmes
As holmes being the murderer, it is fairly certain that in early November 1888 when Mary jane Kelly was murdered he was in Chicago sleeping with his wife as their daughter was born on July 4, 1889.
Everything I have read about this theory is less than compelling to me.
I’m ashamed to admit this - but I’m Jack the Ripper.
You see, the world really did end in 2012, as the blood-thirsty Aztec deities were finally starved of the last bits of power needed to sustain the Earth from the all-devouring rage of the Infinite Darkness. Seeing the final destruction of All That Is, I was contacted by Quetzecoatl to build a Time Machine, enabling me to reach backwards in history far enough to ensure that the 20th Century would become violent - to slake the terrible hunger of Those Who Dwell Beneath. The Ripper murders were merely the first step in my plot, deaths caused when the stars were properly aligned.
Thereafter, I made certain the centuryof peace and prosperity which ended war and hunger was disrupted - causing enough chaos to bring about all the horrors of industrial warfare. Of course, this changed enough of history that Carter DeMayo never produced his brilliant Cosmica Un-Mechanica, which redefined our understanding of all phsyics - in fact, I never joined the Neo-Brazilian Science Academy since it was never created. And never built the time machine in the first place. But humanity shall live on for another few centuries - perhaps then we’ll have found a solution for the Endless Cycle of the old gods.
I’m going to be banned for this, aren’t I?
Knock yerself out, kid! Pay special attention to how they “rip” Cornwell’s theory regarding Sickert. And please note that she is just an amateur like the rest of us and the closest she got to real police and forensic work was as a technical writer and computer analyst at the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of Virginia.
I’m going to suggest that this thread be moved to IMHO because there are no factual answers, except that Patricia Cornwell is a self-promoting moron.
I couldn’t finish this book, it was mind-numbingly boring.
Probably some schlub who wasn’t on anybody’s radar and whose name has never seen print. I’m always amazed by the almost universal conviction that a serial killer has to be somebody who is otherwise notable or interesting.
Dr Thomas Cream is a possibility. He was a serial killer who murdered prostitutes. He was in London at the time of the Jack the Ripper murders and he left London right around the time the murders stopped. And his last words (as he was being hanged) were allegedly “I am Jack the-”
But the counter-evidence is there also. The rumors of his last words are unsubstantiated. Cream always killed women by poison not stabbings. And the most compelling evidence of his innocence is the reason why he was in London - he was locked up in prison. (Those who favor Cream as the Ripper argue he wasn’t really locked up.)
Not an answer for the OP but one of the greatest “Ripperologists” is Donald Rumbelow. He offers an excellent Ripper Walking Tour in Whitechapel. I was told by my own walking tour guide there (not, unfortunately, Rumbelow whom I’ve met) that Rumbelow is still consulted by the police when they come across Ripper related information.
My local department is often recruiting Crime Scene Investigators. I suspect that it’s less because of the crime rate and more because people quit after a few months of gathering body parts and portions thereof. Your local community college probably offers courses to qualify you for the job but the ads here imply that they’ll hire you then pay for your courses.
Homicide Detective is a tougher nut to crack. As previously noted, you’ll need to put in some time on the force.
No.
The timing of the crimes is wrong.
If I recall, Holmes was in jail, on a petty charge unrelated to his killings, at the time.
According to Dr Xanthe Mallett of BBC TV’s History Cold Case, Jack may have been Carl Feigenbaum.
I think the main problem with Ripper suspect theories is they have to look for people who for whatever reason have been recorded in history in some way. That means your pool of suspects actually excludes the majority of the population of the time. You are probably missing 99.99% of those who could have been responsible by only selecting suspects who managed to get recorded in history.
Since a large part of the OP calls for opinions, let’s move from General Questions to IMHO.
samclem, moderator
Jack the Ripper was the Loch Ness Monster. I know I’ve seen some compelling evidence somewhere…